“What a cowardly attitude!” Lavinia declared contemptuously. “You allow yourself to be blackmailed like a common criminal.”
Orsi laughed, his equilibrium quickly restored.
“I warned you that a stranger could not understand,” he reminded her. “If the money weren't sent, in ten days or two weeks perhaps, there would be a little accident on the Chiaja—your carriage would be run into; you would be upset, confused, angry. There would be profuse apologies, investigation, perhaps arrests; but nothing would come of it. If the money was still held back something a little more serious would occur. Nothing really dangerous, you understand; but finally the two thousand lire would be gladly paid over and the accidents would mysteriously cease.”
“An outrage!” Lavinia asserted, and Orsi nodded.
“If you had an enemy,” he continued, “you could have her gown ruined in the foyer of the San Carlos; if it were a man he would be caught at his club with an uncomfortable ace in his cuff. At least so I'm assured. I haven't had any reason to look the society up yet.” He laughed prodigiously. “Even murders are ascribed to it. Careful, Cesare, or a new valet will cut your throat some fine morning and your widow walk away with a more graceful man!”
“Your jokes are so stupid.” Lavinia shrugged her shoulders.
He laid the letter on the table's edge and a wandering air bore it slanting to the floor, but he promptly recovered it.
“That must go in the safe,” he ended; “it is well to have a slight grasp on those gentlemen.”
He rose; and a few minutes later Lavinia saw his trim brown launch, with its awning and steersman in gleaming white, rushing through the bay toward Naples.